Jesus' Memorial Gift of his Father.

(An extra letter for memorial week).

---

 

The Gift of Jesus to His Father.

May 26, 2018

Matthew 4: 1-11. 

 

A gift is an expression of worth. The worth of God’s love for us was not mere words but the fact is that He gave His one and only son to pay the purchase price of our salvation. The gift of salvation for man cost the very life of His one and only son. Jesus who loved His father who was willing to die and was killed to pay the price of our salvation with his own blood on the cross to present us to his father as a gift.

 

The one thing that jumps out of the scripture to my observation is that Jesus had the opportunity to save us without suffering and pain of the Cross. Satan personally offered a deal to Jesus to save not only some but the entire human race without exception and freely with no need of the cross. Satan the Prince of this World wanted to hand over to Jesus everything and everybody in exchange of Jesus bowing down before him in worship. “Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor. “All of this I will give to you, he said, if you will bow down and worship me.”

 

To any pragmatic result oriented person, this would have been a good deal, but not to Jesus.  Jesus was not about to give His Father a gift that would not cost Him anything. Jesus came to earth to purchase a gift for God, who so loved the world, and He was going to pay the full price.  The wicked desire of Satan and his followers is to want to have that which belongs to God along. Worship! If Jesus had surrendered to Satan’s temptation, the price would have been too high and the gift worthless.

 

For how good is it to give God a body without a head? Should Jesus have bowed down in worship to Satan, the foot of Satan would have rested on the neck of his bondservant forever. A man belongs to the one before whom he bows down in worship. Worship belongs to God alone because “Hear O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one and you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, strength and mind and you shall love your neighbor as yourself.”  

 

The love and worship of God in faithful prayer and according to the will of God as revealed in scripture is the whole of man that brings back man not only into alignment with God but to oneness and unity. Since our oneness back to God from where we came from and going back into him is the chief end of man, let us not over evaluate ourselves as being by ourselves too precious to him in any way, form, or shape.  What is worth to God in us is the breath of life in our nostrils. That breath given by God at the beginning is taken back to where it came from at the end.

 

At age 70, all my children received a gift of one thousand dollars to celebrate my joy of being their father. They in turn contributed evenly to purchase what I call, “The gift or toy of my pleasure”.  

A Mont Blanc Fountain Pen with a gold tip and several bottles of ink for my writings. Interestingly the cost of their gift matched the gift they all received from me.  

 

In the same way as I enable my children to buy me a gift of my liking that I wholeheartedly welcomed, our Lord also enabled the means to purchase the gift of our souls for the Father who so loved the world. In other words, we are a gift purchased by God for Himself. Nothing is wrong or illegal because God is worth it all and deserves it all. 

 

You may notice that in a way, I gifted myself the gift of the fountain pen. You are right and it is also an illustration of what the Father did in Jesus and through Jesus and for the glory of Jesus and therefore the Father’s own glory. 

 

The only thing that we must not forget is that for a time the life of Jesus was His own and in order to preserve it all He had to do was renounce the cross. But Jesus who loved the father so much did not hesitate to give that which was His own to give up on the cross to buy the gift for God. 

 

In the same way, my children gave from what was theirs and put it together to buy me a gift that cost so much.

 

Gifts are an expression of worth. If we do not give our best to God, then our gift will end at the feet of idols and offend our jealous God who does not share the love of His children with anyone.  

Worship is also service and to serve implies effort, Jesus said, “Make every effort to get praises from God and not from men.”

 

Have a joyful week as you lay down and worship before God who loves you and loves himself and has given the gift of you to himself. Alleluia for our oneness with God in Jesus, the Precious.

 

I stand as a witness of the love of God for you ready to also testify before God of your love for God. I am a naturalized Citizen of the State of Missouri “The show me State”. Please show me your gift to God. Brag about it, I love to see what you got for Jesus.

 

Gerry Gutierrez

 

 PS. The gift of my children to me at Seventy.